Gamesa continues to build on its offshore strategy, announcing plans to open an office in Hamburg, Germany that will supply what is set to become one of the world’s main offshore wind energy markets in coming years.
The Gamesa outpost, staffed by multi-disciplinary teams (sales, technical staff, etc.) will open in the second quarter of this year to complement Gamesa’s existing offshore network. To date, the company has chosen the UK as the global headquarters of its offshore business (sales, technology and manufacturing), and has a technology presence in Virginia (US), where it is developing an initial prototype of the G11X-5.0 MW turbine for testing in the final quarter of 2012. The Hamburg office will also handle marketing activities for onshore turbine systems.
“Germany represents one of the world’s top offshore wind energy think tanks, drawing engineers, lending institutions, subcontractors and customers. We also chose Hamburg as the site of our next offshore office because of its proximity to our potential customers and their needs,” said José Luis Blanco, managing director of Gamesa’s offshore business.
Gamesa has stated that it intends to play a major role in the offshore business to guarantee its ability to tap demand generated in the Northern European market.
The company is currently engaged in the design and development of two families of offshore turbines, based on the proven and validated technologies used in its G10X-4.5 MW turbine. Initial prototypes of the G11X system, with unit capacity of 5 MW, will be tested in the final quarter of 2012, with a pre-series ready in 2013. Gamesa is also at work on developing another family of offshore turbines, the G14X, with capacity of 6 MW-7 MW, whose pre-series is scheduled to debut in 2015.
( gamesa )
[mappress]
Source: gamesa, April 04, 2011